Restaurant Group Rights Issue and Brexit Gloom

Restaurant Group (RTN) have announced the terms of the rights issue that is required to even part finance their proposed acquisition of Wagamama. I made some somewhat negative comments on that deal in a previous blog post and the general media comment has likewise been negative.

The rights issue is to raise £315 million at a price per share of 108.5p which is a discount of 57% discount to the last trading day price. Net debt will also increase substantially and the current dividend will be very much reduced. The high dividend yield was one of the reasons investors might have bought the shares in the last year so they will be very disappointed.

Investors Champion suggested that investors might have been “stitched up” and that buying anything from private equity owners is a recipe for a poor outcome. All I know is that I am very wary about buying rights issues that are at a steep discount since I got suckered into buying shares in RBS back in 2008. It usually means that advisors have told the company that there is little appetite for the issue because it is perceived as risky, and hence nobody is going to take up the rights offer, or underwrite it, without a very big incentive.

The share price has been falling further today after the announcement and is down over 5% at the time of writing.

Brexit Gloom

The pound has been falling and so has my portfolio today despite the fact that a lower pound will help many of the companies I hold – but when markets are falling there is nowhere to hide. Apparently this is over concerns that Mrs May won’t be able to either agree a deal with the EU; or even if agreed, won’t be able to get it through her cabinet or Parliament. Cannon to the right of her, cannon to the left of her, cannon behind her, volley’s and thunder’d, stormed at with shot and shell … but still she pushed forward with the Chequers deal into the valley of death (to paraphrase Alfred Tennyson).

Personally I thought the Chequers proposal was a good basis for a deal with the EU but the Irish border issue is a likely deal breaker. Time for a rethink perhaps? But I don’t mean another referendum as I don’t believe the general public have any enthusiasm for another lengthy political campaign and there is little time for one.

The Financial Times (FT) had the usual negative Brexit stories today which is getting very tiresome. I would cancel my subscription if it was not for the occasional useful article they publish. With news short over the weekend I think the editor might be instructing his staff to produce articles to fill the space on Monday focused on Brexit. This time it was how Brexit is weakening productivity growth, Ramsgate being on standby for a crisis at Dover, immigration curbs that worry meat processors and an editorial focused on the “serious” Jo Johnson. Apparently meat processors employ more than 60% of staff who come from the EU. I am not scared.

Will we run out of fried chicken or beef-burgers? Probably not because as the article points out some of the tasks can be automated. They clearly have not been to date because cheap foreign labour makes it uneconomic. My conclusion is that Brexit will improve productivity enormously to the benefit of the economy and help those low-paid workers whose wages have been depressed by immigration.

But there was one interesting article in the FT today. That was about the popularity of “proxy resignation services” in Japan. These are organisations that will take on the task of telling your boss you have quit if you are too embarrassed to do so. Fed up with your company, your work or the bullying boss. Just call “Exit” to give your notice on the required date and they handle it from then on. No need to even face your colleagues or be accused of being a quitter.

This is simply the reverse of the amusing George Clooney film “Up in the Air” where he ran an outplacement service for companies, i.e. took on the task of firing people in a way that avoided difficult conversations.

There should be a market for such services in the UK, but perhaps it should be extended to helping you dump your girlfriends or wives? So much better than having emotional confrontations. So there’s an idea to pursue for some entrepreneurial web developer. Even Mrs May’s cabinet might find such a service useful in the next few weeks.